I tugged on what I thought was a black locust twig (Robinia pseudoacacia) stuck in the snow but I quickly found out it that was still attached to the stump by dragging the side of my hand over its thorns. Yes, those thorns are every bit as sharp as they look. To be botanically accurate, they are actually stipules. A stipule is a growth that appears on either side of a leaf stalk (petiole.) In the case of the black locust these stipules have been modified into sharp spines, so that makes them stipular spines.
If the stipular spines don’t convince you that you’re looking at a black locust, the flat seed pods will. These dark brown pods stay attached to the tree and their color lightens during the winter. Finally as spring nears they begin to fall and, though they are light and can be blown long distances, many can be found under the tree on top of the snow, as the photo shows. The tiny brown seeds look like miniature beans. Their coating is very tough and black locust seeds can remain viable for many years.
Another locust that I see regularly is the honey locust (Gleditsia triacanthos), which in my opinion bears the king of all thorns. These thorns are big and as hard as iron. They can reach 6 inches in length and poke right out of the bark of the tree along its branches and sometimes even the main trunk. They are tough enough to puncture shoe soles and I always watch my step when I walk under one of these trees because thorns like these can cause a nasty wound. Confederate soldiers once used them to pin their uniforms together and survivalists still use them as fish hooks, spear heads, nails, sewing needles and even small game traps.
I wondered what could have created these perfectly round holes on this dead white pine log (Pinus strobus). They weren’t in the usual neat rows that a sap sucker makes and anyway they were much larger than sapsucker holes. Each hole was about 3/8 inch in diameter and after some Googling I found that an invasive horntail called the Sirex woodwasp (Sirex noctilio) likes pine trees and makes exactly these kinds of holes. But it hasn’t been found in New Hampshire yet, so it was back to more Googling. The Asian long horned beetle (Anoplophora glabripennis) is another invasive species that makes holes just like this but it only attacks hardwoods, so again it was back to Google. Finally I found that a native beetle called the white spotted pine sawyer (Monochamus scutellatus) makes holes in weak and damaged white pines but I couldn’t find a good example of its hole, so I really don’t have an answer.
Being an engineer by trade these days I’m fascinated by any creature that could make such a perfectly round hole. Maybe I should have poked around in there. The photo makes it look like something might have been at home. If you know what makes holes like this I’d love to hear from you.
It might be spring but the “winter” mushrooms are still going strong. One of my favorites is the milk white toothed polypore (Irpex lacteus,) which in my experience is hardly ever really milk white. Its teeth lean more towards tan or yellowish brown. The teeth start life as tubes or pores in the spore bearing surface, which breaks apart with age to become tooth like as the above photo shows. This crust fungus is common on fallen branches and rotting logs.
I found this native northern maleberrry (Lyonia ligustrina) shrub growing between two highbush blueberry shrubs on the river bank. Maleberry is sometimes called male blueberry because the flowers look much like blueberry flowers, but the fruit of the two bushes is very different. The fruit on this bush is a hard, woody, 5 part seed pod. Maleberry fruit is said to make a good insect repellant, but you have to get them before they become hard and woody. Native Americans used its straight young stems to make bows, so its wood must be quite strong, flexible, and elastic. It is said that the wood also makes good fence posts but I’ve never seen a maleberrry branch that was big enough in diameter to be used for one.
Maleberrry is one of the easiest of all our native shrubs to identify in winter because its seed pods persist until spring. I just look for the star. There’s a very good chance when you find a maleberrry that there will be blueberries growing nearby.
The first insect I’ve seen since last fall was a winter stonefly. This one was living up to its name by resting on top of a granite post near the Ashuelot River. Its nymphs live beneath rocks and gravel on the bottom of streams and rivers. When the adults emerge they can be found along river and pond banks all winter long, so they are not a good indicator of spring. The adults feed on blue-green algae and the nymphs on aquatic plants. Hungry trout love to eat the nymphs and fishermen use them as live bait.
Willows have just started showing their furry gray catkins and if we hadn’t plunged back into another cold snap it wouldn’t have been too long before we saw their flowers. The cold we’re seeing now will hold them back for a while but it won’t hurt them any. Willows are a spring favorite that many of us enjoy seeing but they’re famous for clogging any type of piping with their moisture seeking roots, so they should never be planted close to a house. They’re great for planting along stream and pond banks because their extensive root systems help hold the soil in place.
The spring blooming witch hazels in a local park that I visit have been slow to unfurl their strap shaped flower petals, but if you look closely you can see that the bud scales are opening enough to show the 4 bright yellow petals tucked up into the buds. Spring witch hazels often make the mistake of blooming too early and their flower petals turn brown because of damage from the cold, but not this year. Each bud in this photo is about as big as a small pea.
Speckled alder catkins are just showing signs of producing pollen, as the greenish smudges on the larger male catkins in this photo shows. Soon the bud scales will pull back and the flowers will open. Spring is happening but right now you have to look around a bit to see it.
The one plant that tells me that spring is really here is skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus). It doesn’t waste time worrying that it might be too cold; it just raises its internal temperature and melts its way through the ice and snow and shouts that spring is finally here. I don’t know if the black bears are coming out of hibernation yet but if they are they’ll be happy to see skunk cabbages. It’s often the only food available to them in early spring.
You can just see the rounded greenish yellow flower head through the opening in the red and yellow mottled spathe on this one. This plant is called skunk cabbage for a good reason, and it is thought that its odor attracts pollinators like flies, stoneflies and bees. Since skunk cabbage can raise its internal temperature by as much as 35º F above the surrounding air temperature, it is also thought that warmth might be another reason that insects visit them.
Spring is sooner recognized by plants than by men. ~Chinese Proverb
Thanks for stopping in and happy spring!
Note: Today marks the start of the fifth year of this blog. I’ll take this opportunity to say that I appreciate your continued interest and I thank you very much for taking the time to read about what I think is important, and for leaving such thoughtful and often very helpful comments.
Allen
Beautiful nature study, beautiful photos. Thank you!
You’re welcome, and thank you.
Celebration of life and beauty.
Congratulations on four years of effort and attainment. 🙂
Thank you Ben.
The mystery holes are interesting and I love the skunk cabbage, what a weird and winderful plant. I hope your hand is ok after those thorns.
Thanks! Black locust thorns are said to be toxic but my hand itched for a few days and that was all. I’d hate to step on them!
That doesn’t bear thinking about
What a fascinating post.
“The Case of the Mysterious Holes”!
I like your skunk cabbage photos best. Amazing that something with such a bad smell can take such nice photographs.
Thank you Cynthia.
Yes, as it turns out those holes are even more mysterious than I first thought.
I’m careful when I’m taking photos of skunk cabbage. If you step on one you know it right away.
Happy anniversary! I am a big fan of your blog and have enjoyed it and recommended it to friends for a couple years now. Thank you for your wonderful photos, insights and quotes. I look forward to many more happy emails to come.
You’re welcome Wendi, and thank you for telling your friends about the blog! My theory is the more people get interested in nature the less apt they are to want to harm it, so thanks very much for helping to get them interested.
I couldn’t agree more. That’s why I’ve been a volunteer at the New England Wildfire Society for over 12 years.
I’ve never heard of the wildfire society but if it gets people interested in nature I’m all for it.
I think you are a kindered spirit, see the website at newfs.org I hope you enjoy it.
Oh, the wildflower society. Yes, I know it well. They chose 6 of my wildflower photos to be in their new wildflower guide that’s due out in February, which was a real honor.
Hi there! Great post. I’ve been reading your blog regularly for a while and always love it. I have learned many things that have been useful to me as a grad student working with ecology students at Dartmouth. I’m writing because your photos of the holes caught my eye. I am doing my graduate work on Sirex noctilio and was super happy to see someone mention learning about Sirex being in the northeast! I thought I’d toss out my 2 cents on the topic. As far as we have seen so far, Sirex noctilio seems to colonize white pines very rarely. They prefer the hard pines (e.g., red pine (Pinus resinosa), planted scots pine (Pinus sylvestris)) and I have not seen any Sirex in white pine (though it is certainly possible- and interesting, if these were)! However, there are also some native Siricid woodwasps, which colonize recently dead wood. One is Sirex nigricornis, which I have not collected in NH but have collected in VT over multiple years. One of the unique things about Sirex noctilio is their preference for living trees (though they normally colonize weakened trees that are in decline). There are also several other native Siricid species, but I’m not sure which tend to colonize white pine. You are right that perfectly round holes– especially if their size varied a little bit– are likely to be a woodwasp. If you are interested in more information, let me know! Cheers, Flora Krivak-Tetley Ecology PhD student, Ayres lab Dartmouth College also at fkt.gr@dartmouth.edu
On Sat, Mar 21, 2015 at 4:11 AM, New Hampshire Garden Solutions wrote:
> New Hampshire Garden Solutions posted: ” I tugged on what I thought > was a black locust twig (Robinia pseudoacacia) stuck in the snow but I > quickly found out it that was still attached to the stump by dragging the > side of my hand over its thorns. Yes, those thorns are every bit as sharp > as they”
Thank you for the excellent information on wood wasps. From what I’ve read there aren’t many wood wasps that do like white pines. I had high hopes for Urocerus gigas flavicornis but it appears to prefer hard pines as well. It’s very difficult to find much information on wasp + tree + exit hole, it seems. You can find information on one or two, but not all three. Maybe you should consider compiling such a document!
There is a fairly good Siricid guide here: http://www.fs.fed.us/foresthealth/technology/pdfs/GuideSiricidWoodwasps.pdf but again it says very little about the wasp, its host tree, and its exit hole.
Thanks again for your help and good luck in your career. I hope you’ll stop in every now and then.
Congratulations on 4 great years!
Thanks Montucky!
Congratulations on starting your fifth year of blogging! I still look forward to your posts, I’ve learned a great deal from you, so here’s to hoping that you continue your blog for another five years.
I have no idea what would have made such large holes in a tree, other than perhaps a smaller species of carpenter bee.
Thanks Jerry! I don’t know about another 5 years but I don’t plan on stopping just yet. There’s still too much to see!
I didn’t think of carpenter bees. I’ll have to read up on them.
It’s amazing how much color you found so early. Congratulations on 5 years blogging!
Thanks! Yes, I was surprised too!
I’m going to try to keep my distance from honey locusts. American plum is another tree with nasty spines that it sends up from the ground as it suckers. I have never heard of maleberry, kind of an interesting name.
No, you wouldn’t want a native honey locust in your garden but there are thornless varieties that make great specimen trees. I’ve also met some wild crabapples that were on the thorny side.
Maleberry doesn’t have a lot going for it as a garden shrub, but the blueberry like flowers are kind of nice.
Congratulations and here’s to five more years!
Leigh Macmillen Hayes
Thanks very much Leigh, I’m glad you’re enjoying this blog.
An education as always and a delight to the eye as well.
Thank you.
It is good to know that Nature knows when it is spring. Our ‘pussy willow’ catkins are just appearing here too – our spring always seems such slow and steady progress compared with yours. One week you are suffering sub-sub-zero temperatures and the next week catkins and flowers abound! I see quite a few black locust trees here as they seem to be a favourite foreign tree to plant in gardens. People seem to like the cultivar with golden-yellow leaves best, though I think I prefer the ordinary green leaves as the flowers show up better against them. I love the shot of the alder catkins!
Thank you Clare. That’s true; our spring can be very up and down as it is this year. We were in the 50s and then it was right back to the low 20sF. Now they say we’ll see 50s again mid week.
I think the locust with golden yellow leaves might actually be a thornless honey locust called sunburst (Gleditsia triacanthos var. inermis ‘Suncole.’) It’s popular here too but like you I prefer the green. Plant breeders have bred the thorns from them as well.
I thought of you when I was taking photos of those alder catkins. That was the only one of many that was near sharp. I wish I knew what made them so hard to get a good photo of!
You are no doubt right about the locust tree. I was hoping you’d found the knack of getting a clearly-focused alder catkin shot and might impart your knowledge!
I’m afraid it was just luck and the advanced image stabilization of my camera!
Just my luck!
Five years, Wow! Congratulations. Love your shots of the skunk cabbage!
Thanks! Just starting the 5th year. It really doesn’t seem like it’s been that long.
Reading your posts is a delight. Many thanks.
Thanks very much Margaret, I’m glad that you think so.
NHG, Happy anniversary! Amazingly, I found I learned from you to recognize the skunk cabbage; something I never tho’t I’d be able to do, all the growing things you find are new to me. So, it seems to me it’s one down from so many I do not know. Whether you were or not, you are an amazing teacher. MCS
Thank you Mary. It’s really just a matter of getting out there if you’re able and looking closely, and I think you’d see most of these things for yourself. Depending on what part of the country you live in, of course. I doubt that you’d find skunk cabbage in Arizona or Utah.
I’ve been a gardener and then an engineer but never a teacher. I’ve always enjoyed helping people though, so maybe that’s where it comes from.
Reblogged this on Dawn of Divine Rays and commented:
Happy 5th Blogging Anniversary, Allen. Namaste
Thank you Agnes. Have a great weekend!
Happy Blog Anniversary. I’ve only been a reader for a short time, but I look forward to each new edition. Don’t know if you were a teacher pre-retirement, but you have a knack of providing information that makes me want to hit the books!
Thank you Judy. No, I wasn’t a teacher, and I’m not even retired yet. I’m just very curious and love exploring nature. I also try to get others interested in nature and that’s really what this blog is all about. I think you’d have a lot more fun hitting the trail than you would the books!
For the holes in the pine log, did you look at the white pine weevil? http://www.na.fs.fed.us/spfo/pubs/fidls/wp_weevil/weevil.htm
I didn’t but thank you for the very interesting article. I see a lot of pine weevil damage here and it always affects the terminal leader on the tree, so I didn’t think that these insects did much damage lower down. The article says that their exit holes are only 1/8 inch in diameter though, and that’s much smaller than those in the photos. Their large 3/8 inch size was one of the things that made them so remarkable. Thanks for the help!
Dear Allen, Happy anniversary! I only found your blog a few months ago, but I am already a devoted reader. I especially enjoy your approachâthat we can find excitement in nature on foot right out our back doors here in New England (I live in central Maine.)
Carry on! Kit Pfeiffer
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Thank you Kit. I’m glad to hear that so many people from Maine are enjoying this blog; it’s one of my favorite places to vacation.
Yes, it’s true that we really don’t even have to leave our own yards to find some very fascinating things. I’ve spent years exploring my own yard and the surrounding neighborhood and still find something new almost every time I go for a walk. Have fun!
Here in old Europe we have Arum maculatum and a host of it’s relatives. Not as early as your skunk cabbage, but very similar to it as it comes out in early spring, entices insects with its foetid smell and maintains within it’s spatha a slightly higher temperature, that also serves to attract insects and so guarantees pollination.
Stunning are those perfect round holes in that old log – I first thought somebody took samples for dendrochronology.
Thank you Zyriacus. I knew you had Lords and Ladies which is very similar to our Jack in the pulpit and is also in the Arum family, but I didn’t know about the Arum maculatum.
That’s exactly what I thought when I saw those round holes. They look like they were made by a power tool. Since the log was on a riverbank that’s doubtful, but possible I suppose.
Fascinating stuff, as always! I look at locust differently since I learned a few years ago that they likely evolved their thorns as protections against animals that have been extinct for thousands of years. I Googled to find an article about it—here’s a link to one of them.
http://www.americanforests.org/magazine/article/trees-that-miss-the-mammoths/
Thank you Al. That’s a real interesting article! Interesting to think that some plants produce fruit and grow thorns to entice and protect themselves from animals that no longer exist. You have to wonder how they will evolve in the future. I feel like I should scatter some honey locust seeds now!
Thank you for the visual assurance of the equinox! I greatly appreciate your eyes and mindfulness on the natural world here. It encourages me to continue my own rambles, as I learn to raise my own awareness. Looking forward to finding the first skunk cabbage on the west side of the river (southeast Vermont)!
You’re welcome, and thank you. I hope you can find some skunk cabbage. They’re very interesting plants and I wouldn’t be surprised if they grew along the banks of the Connecticut. I find them in a local swamp. They like being very close to water and don’t mind being flooded occasionally.
Hooray for the skunk cabbage! Spring can’t be far behind!!
It doesn’t feel it today, but spring is on the way!
Congratulations on the milestone! Those lucust thorns remind me of a shrub I found while out here http://www.desertusa.com/flora/crucifixion-thorn.html Barely brushing against it caused puncture wounds on my hand. Love to see the signs of spring in your post!
Thank you Laura. It’s hard to believe this is the 5th year of this blog.
Wow, that crucifixion thorn bush looks like a mean one! I guess you don’t go wandering through the desert at night with things like that out there. I hope your hand has healed.
EVERY thing out here has thorns of some kind. Sadly today we are heading towards home. I’m not really ready, but I doubt I would be for a long time.
If you have time you should read the article that Al linked to. It says a lot about why some plants are so thorny.
I hope you have a good and safe trip home!
What you see and how you photograph the image are twin marvels. The one a result of your artistic eye, the other a result of your photographic skills. I marvel at your talents. That last picture is a winner.
Thank you for your kind words Susan. I don’t suppose you have anything like skunk cabbage in England. It’s a very unusual plant!